bits of life I can't bare to forget

Avett and this frog may be one of my favorite pictures.  He is all boy, interested in creatues and curious and doesnt have a care in the world to get dirty...or peed on.  He discovered this little frog while we were at Herman C. Michael park for a playdate this week.  He was quite gentle and wanted terribly to bring it home as a pet.  The frog looks very unimpressed with the whole idea.

Today was the opening day for the Athens Farmers Market.  I don't know why I feel so fancy walking out of there with fresh pastries and cut flowers.  Today we went home with Poppies and Ranunculus.  I love the sense of community in Athens and it feels good to be apart of it.  

Just a little example of running errands with these two crazy ones.  They were giddy about these tiny carts.  I love that Evie's hair is getting longer.  She is so beautiful.  We bought orange chicken, which Avett thinks is too spicy, and some Indian food, and some cocoa batons which were all gone with in an hour.

This past week we went to my mother's and Evie came in baring this birds nest as a great outdoor prize.  She asked that we put it in a bag for her to bring home.  She copied "birds nest"  and I couldn't be more in love with the fact that some of her letters are backwards.

Playing in the barn, climbing hay bails, getting messy, my allergies are going crazy.

Rode BOB with mom across the street to return a shovel.  We stayed a while to look at the flowers and then rode BOB around with the perfect amount of wind in our hair and faces. I love big tulips.

Avett got the giggles SO hard for a good 10 minutes at Fresh Aire Barbeque when we went with our cousins last week.  I never figured out what it was but I suspect he thought it was funny that Mason was being a little naughty ransacking the restaurant.

Evie has been writing her fairy friend, Ella, through a door on the wall in her room.  They are great friends.  She anticipates every single correspondence.  That last letter she got (which took quite a while to get back to her, apparently fairy mail can take a lot of time)  Ella told her she was sorry it took her a while to respond and that she was busy preparing for a fairy ball!  Well Evie decided that we must make her a dress for the ball so she designed it, picked out the fabric, and then we sewed it right up!  I love her creative soul.

Well I just had no idea she loved this log so very much.  When she found out that part of it was going to be cut and given to a friend of ours to make some things she was devastated.  She went in to full on sobs and went and sat on the log in tears.  After Momomee gave her best shot to comfort her I went down and we hugged and she cried some more.  We decided to take a picture of the log and she took it.  Then we edited a picture where she circled the log, put a heart on it, and then pecked out every little letter to spell "This is Evie's favorite log."  

A very tender hearted soul.  I wouldn't have it any other way.

Lately

Lately:

We spent the weekend at my cousin Britney's to take care of her 4 kids while they were away celebrating their 10 year anniversary. We went to the zoo with 6 kids and while it was crazy, it was a blast!

A woman at church recently was moving and tried to sell her piano. When she had no luck she decided to give it away for free! So now I have a piano here in Athens and I am going to try to build up a studio here to help make some money while john is still in school. I am grateful to be able to contribute and to use my love for music to help others and our family.

We have great neighbors.  The other day the I bought a pool at Walmart for $7.88 and filled it up from the sink bowl of water by bowl of water.  The kids jumped in their bathing suits and ended up washing the cars out in the playground! They used a whole can of shaving cream and they loved it!

We have been studying creativity and imaginination at joy school and the kids learned about spontaneous delight at Amy's house and we played with shaving cream and they had so much fun! I love what joy school is teaching them, sometimes Joy and Happiness is a learned skill.  It is so important to find joy in everyday life.

Yesterday the kids and I went to Sandy Creek and hiked the trails and went to the nature center.  They were running full speed through those trails and Avett didn't even care when he would fall and trip over the roots on the path, he would just get right up and keep going,  I loved their enthusiasm for nature.  It's in their blood I know it! 

Evaleigh has been taking an art class and she loves it. We go once a week to the Lyndon House to a beautiful art studio and she creates something, a take on a Van Gogh sea scape or land scape.  She was very proud of the horizon lines she painted two weeks ago.  I feel so proud when i see her creating and being comfortable in her own element.  She loves art so much. 

Evie says....and a paper dress

I just adore our girl.  She is brilliant, organized, responsible, kind, loves to give service and create.

Today we made a paper dress.  She stood so still and just directed me as to what she wanted me to do. It was so fun.  Then she posed and posed and posed, which is not normal for her.  She typically has a very short picture limit.  

Also here are some things she has been saying lately:

My feet smell perfect

There's an ant in my eye or something

Maybe when I grow up and be a mom I can buy that Ariel bottle we saw at the grocery store.

During mom's homecoming talk she was speaking about Adam-on di-Ahman and Evaleigh looked up to me and said, "mom, we've been there to Adam ondi Aman."  It made me so happy!

While eating lunch Evie said, " come here dad I want to show you something!" When john got there he said he didn't see anything. And she said, "exactly because I ate it!" Haha

Can I have some more Cheetah chips? (Pita chips)

Evaleigh Joy Murphy Barbie

Evaleigh is so fun. Just a really good time.  She is always saying the best things and being so willing to give service or help out.  

The other night we were reading family scriptures and I chose to read in Helaman 14 about Samuel the Lamanite prophesying of the birth of Jesus Christ. 

 In verse 8 I read "And it shall come to pass that whosoever shall believe on the Son of God, the same shall have everlasting life."  And she yelled, "everlasting LICE?!"  John and I looked at each other and burst out laughing!! It was a supposed to be spiritual family moment turned hilarious.  

She also insists these days that her name is Evaleigh Joy Murphy Barbie. 

She has a very specific bedtime routine that consists of every little thing in its perfect spot in her bed. Me blowing crazy kisses to her that jump around in her hand. Her bunny blanket only over her feet and the soft blanket on her body. He door must be cracked to a specific width. And on and on...  We love our crazy slightly OCD girl. 

I LOVE her artwork these days.  She draws the cutest happiest faces!!

Evaleigh says

Cramera - camera

Swecret - secret

Falingo - flamingo

Busy - dizzy

Attitude- tattoo

Swallow- swaddled as in "will you swallow my baby?"

Some of these are just so cute I can't bare to correct them.  3 is just the greatest! 

why

Oh dear Avett.  What do I do with you and what would I do with out you? 

You are a mess. An absolute stinker. A conundrum of some sort.  Do you know what you want? Because I don't.  Nearly 20 months together and you keep me on my toes every. blessed. day.

You are entering what i like to call: the parrot stage. You are mimicking phrases and sounds all of the time.  This week Evaleigh said "daughter" and you followed right along and said the same.  Yesterday I was trying to teach Evaleigh how to say a clear "v" on veil instead of "bail" as it was coming out.  

"V...v...v...veil." I would say and you would trail right along behind like my little echo. 

Your all time favorite word right now other than obviously "no", is "whyyyyy".  I think you've been absorbing your sisters form of communication a little too much. 

If we ask you to come inside you say, "why?" If we tell you to sit down you say, "why?"   It's much too much sass for any 20 month old.  Either you have great timing or really you do understand what we are saying.

Tonight on our family trip to Target to buy diapers your dad and I just got right in your face and started saying "why" over and over to you.  You just grinned slyly and looked away to the side.  You know you are a mess and you get away with it.

You say "uh oh" as loud as you can and then throw whatever you can on the ground.  You got it all backwards.

You. Climb. On. Everything.

You want nothing more than to sit in the refrigerator and pull out yogurts to hand me.  

You enjoy hitting me and then when i tell you, "be gentle to your mommy." You run my face ever so softly.

You sleep with lavender diffused in your room every night and you love to sniff it before going to sleep. You scrunch up your nose and it's the cutest.

We love each other a lot. A lot.

Right now

I am just REALLY loving this little girl right now.  This afternoon I was flashing a reflection from my phone around on the ceiling and Evaleigh thought it was a fairy. She thought the fairy was playing with her and was hiding under the lamp shade.  I bounced the light up and down from the couch to the wall and she said, "Look! She is jumping on the couch!" So she did the same.  I just adore childhood imagination.

I love that she calls Avett, "little buddy".  "Come on my little buddy, No little buddy don't eat that."  It's the best.

The other night she and I made cupcakes together after Avett went to sleep.  I love our alone time.  

She sings and dances every day. Yesterday's song of the day was Stay with me by Sam smith and Damaged a la Pentatonix version.  Her dance moves are getting increasingly sassy.

Love her love her love her love her love her love her. 

My kids are growing so fast.  I know that when I was younger I always heard that time would speed up the older you got.  Being in the throws of young motherhood is sometimes a blur for me.  It's filled with all sorts of mundane tasks...mealtimes, diapers, toddler breakdowns, naptimes...rinse repeat.  Sometimes I wish the clothes didn't have to be clean and that we never had to eat so I could sit back and take in the view of my little ones growing. Or better yet climb into an indistinguishable mound of bodies with them and giggle on the living room floor until it was bed time without a thought of to do's.

I love them both fiercely.  I can't put in to words how Avett makes me feel when he spots me from across the room and a smile displaying his gappy toothed grin spreads across his face and he walks over and fumbles to me and forces his body straight in to mine from a standing position with the most innocent trust that I'll always catch him.  We hug for the grand total of 2 seconds if I'm lucky and then he squirms to get loose because everything must be explored.  He's just starting to babble nonsense and when he does John and I look at each other as if it's the best inside joke we share and then we laugh about it.

Evaleigh gets smarter everyday.  She will correct me if I'm wrong and will say things that I had no clue she even knew.  She loves to make us laugh and the other day at the dinner table she called me a "plate of cookies" and told everyone to eat me up.  She is getting more and more beautiful and is finally getting some hair to speak of, it's a big deal for us. 

Kids are just really really fun.  A lot of work and a lot of messes.  But all around just pretty fantastic little people to share your life with, even when it's a blur.

bucket list

Last Thursday while at the Songs of Water concert I was so moved by the music that I started thinking about what I wanted to do with my life.  There are two things I am certain I want to do and that is to stay close to The Lord and close to my family no matter what.  Other than that these are a few things that I'd love to spend the time in my life doing.  Bucket lists are a pretty personal thing but here is mine for the sake of posterity maybe finding it one day or an older version of myself looking back to see what I actually ended up doing.

Take a calligraphy class

Learn to play cello

Learn how to make a really delicious cheese from scratch

Take a floral design class

Start a Childrenhelp Georgia chapter

Become respit certified for foster kids

Compete in the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions before I'm too old, just to hear what they have to say.

Travel to Greece

Travel to Israel

Travel to Italy 

Go to all of the LDS temples in the world.  28 down only 114 to go if they quit building them ;)

Spend two weeks in Nauvoo one summer as a family cast in the pageant

Write and record a gospel album with my husband

Go to every John Mayer, James Taylor, and Avett Brothers concert I can.

Read everything I can about the gospel of Jesus Christ

Learn to speak German Spanish Hebrew and Italian

Travel to the Sacred Grove

Perform opera and broadway again after all of the kids get in to school

Start a music school

Start a summer music camp for kids

Lactation consultant

Doula

Work with children in other countries

Start/fund an orphan home in another country

Go back to school for a masters degree in voice or vocal ped

Adopt a child/children

Serve a mission with John when we are old and gray

After showing John this list he said, "Well that's doable."  Glad I'll get to check a few of these off my list with him by my side.

half a year

Well here we are.  I've blinked and half of the year has gone by.  I just can't imagine life without you.  You are such a consuming little human being, in the best way possible.  I just want to stare at you and see your flirty little side smiles all day long.  

You will most likely crawl this week or next, you keep pushing up on to your hands and knees.  

You are obsessed with Evaleigh, you want to watch everything she does.

You love when I sing to you it makes you smile and stop what you are doing.

Last week you randomly started taking a paci, that's weird.  Your sister never ever took one and neither did you until now.  You love it!

You are starting to level out with your growth. You are 20 pounds and 27 inches, still big but not as shocking as before.

You adore your father, as soon as he enters the room you want all of his attention. And you get it.